Photo credit: Jason Mandella
Barnaby Furnas’ contemporary history paintings depict a variety of subjects including battle scenes, lovers, and rock and roll concerts. His renowned series of ‘flood paintings’ illustrate the monumental movement of water, and the biblical parting of the red sea. Within these works, Furnas’ process involves lofting the canvas diagonally in the air and pouring liquidbased paints in abstract expressionist gestures over the top. Furnas refers to this technique as “huge spill management,” pointing to the organic evolution of the 2-dimensional works of art. These canvases, in all their dynamism, striking color, and size suggest the powers of nature andFurnas’ ability to utilize the canvas as both a zone for experience and as a window into history.
Barnaby Furnas was born in Philadelphia in 1973, and lives and works in New York. Furnas completed his MFA at Columbia University, New York in 2000, and BFA at the School of Visual Arts, New York in 1995. Barnaby Furnas has staged solo museum exhibitions at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Denver, USA (2009); the Museum of Modern Art Forth Worth, Dallas, USA (2007); and Baltic Centre of Contemporary Art, Gateshead (2005). His work has been included in group exhibitions Back to Eden: Contemporary Artists Wander the Garden, Museum of Biblical Art, New York (2014); The Old, Weird America, Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, Houston (2008); True Romance. Allegories of Love from the Renaissance to the Present, Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna (2007); Dream & Trauma. Works from the Dakis Joannou collection, Athens, MUMOK, Vienna, Austria (2007); Imagination Becomes Reality, Museum of Contemporary Art at ZKM, Karlsruhe, Germany (2007); Art in America: Now, Museum of
Contemporary Art, Shanghai, China (2007); USA Today, Royal Academy of Arts, London (2006); The Whitney Biennial, The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, US
